INDIA: EXECUTION OF MURDER CONVICT STAYED

the execution of murder convict Ajay Kumar Pal, scheduled for early morning on September 27, was stayed after the Supreme Court admitted his special leave petition. The special CBI court of Mohammad Numan Ali forwarded the faxed message from the apex court to the authorities at the Birsa Munda central jail directing it to put the execution on hold. The execution was fixed by the CBI court on September 5 after the Jharkhand High Court upheld its order of August 28. The CBI court on April 9 this year awarded death sentence to Pal for murdering the wife, two children, a nephew of his boss Dhirendra Kumar, a forest conservator. Pal, a domestic help, drugged the family members and beat them up with rods before setting fire to the house on June 2, 2003. The hanging would have been the first since the creation of Jharkhand seven years ago.